Cong answerable for Sidhu’s actions: BJP

Punjab mantri attends Imran oath event

Taking on the Congress and its president Rahul Gandhi over party leader and former cricketer Navjot Singh Sidhu’s hug to Pakistan Army Chief Qamar Javed Bajwa and then sitting next to Pakistan-occupied Kashmir’s ( PoK) “socalled president” Masood Khan at the swearing- in ceremony of cricket er turnedpolitician Imran Khan, the Bharatiya Janata Party ( BJP) on Saturday said the Opposition party is answerable to 125 crore Indians for the “heinous crime” its leader had committed. Mr Sidhu, a minister in the Captain Amrinder Singh- led Punjab government, was in Pakistan to attend the oath- taking ceremony of Mr Khan as its 22nd Prime Minister.

Slamming Mr Sidhu for hugging the Pakistani army chief, BJP national spokesperson Sambit Patra asked why the Congress leader did not remember the Indian soldiers who were martyred or their family members when he was hugging general Bajwa. The BJP leader also asked why Mr Sidhu did not object when the “so- called” President of PoK was made to sit next to him.

“Indians have taken it very seriously and Congress needs to answer some serious questions,” said Mr Patra as he asked the Congress president whether Mr Sidhu had sought his permission to visit Pakistan and if was he granted the permission.

Citing earlier statements made by some Congress leaders, Mr Patra said former Union minister Salman Khurshid had claimed,

while on Pakistani soil in 2015, that Prime Minister Narendra Modi does not want peace with it and had congratulated Pakistan for its actions against terror.

He said after two days another Congress leader, Mani Shankar Aiyar, sought Pakistan’s help against Mr Modi and then recently Ghulam Nabi Azad made a statement in Pakistan against the Indian Army giving oxygen to Pakistan and also got a certificate from terror organisation, Lashkar- e- Tayyiba.

“You ( Sidhu) have more

faith in general Bajwa who told you that it is time for peace, but here ( in India) your own party colleague calls your Army chief a sadak ka gunda and asks for proof of the surgical strike ( against terror camps in PoK).”

“How could you hug somebody who is responsible for terror activities in your own country? Why do you want to thank Pakistan, who kills innocent civilians of your own country and who foment terror against your country,” asked BJP spokesperson Mr Patra.